Mary in London- 2019: April 2019

Here are pictures from my excursion to the Scottish Highlands. As you can see it was beautiful. I do think the Irish countryside has my heart but this was certainly cool! If I ever go back it would be to see the loch where Nessie is- the Lochness monster! I learned that Scotland has more than 40,000 lochs (lakes!) that's crazy to me! We saw two castles that day: Doune Castle and Inveraray Castle. The Downton Abbey Christmas special was filmed at Inveraray Castle!

Forth Bridge in South Queensferry

the Kelpies and me...

The Kelpies! (they're 30m high) they
cost 8 million pounds to build....

Callander, Scotland

Mac Pie from Mhor Bread!

Doune Castle

Callandar, Scotland

Inveraray

Inverraray

Inveraray

lunch spot

Inveraray Caslte

sheep

Luss, Scotland

Shockingly delicious ice cream!

Edinburgh was another city I adored. It was absolutely charming. It wasn't swamped with people and there was so much to do! Our program actually ran this trip for us which was so nice as it required little planning on our end. My friend Liz and I don't have classes on Thursdays so we went up a day early. The train was about five hours. It was pleasant aside from the fact that we left at 6am- ha. Once in Edinburgh we checked into our hostel St. Christopher's (where we also stayed in Paris). The people of Edinburgh are so outgoing and friendly. Upon entering our room we saw that the cleaners were still in there and the guy told Liz and I to look out the window. We obliged and he said and pointed "see there? That's the Balmoral Hotel. It costs 1200 pounds each night and this hostel has the same views!" He wasn't being sarcastic we really did have a cool view and of the hotel itself which is iconic.

The first afternoon in Edinburgh, we went on a Potter Trails tour. I'm not a huge Harry Potter fan but have an appreciation so I wanted to do it. We saw many of the spots where JK Rowling wrote the books along with the school that inspired Hogwarts. The coolest part of the tour was seeing Victoria Street or Diagon Alley. We also saw a graveyard where she is said to have gotten inspiration for many of the names including Tom Riddle and McGonnagall. Our guide was also a wizard LOL and he gave us wands for the duration of the tour.

We also got to see spectacular views of Edinburgh from Calton Hill. It's so cool to see the city and the ocean from this high. That night we had dinner at our beloved Nando's (no shame).

The next morning we went to the National Museum of Scotland because it was ~free~ and that is all our budget allows hahaha. Liz and I were both blown away!! I had personally expected it to walls of portraits of dead Scottish soldiers but instead this museum was filled with science and technology collections along with some super cool art and fashion displays. We didn't plan on spending much time in there but we probably spent over 2 hours there.

That afternoon the rest of our program arrived from London. We did a walking tour. My big takeaway was the story of Maggie Dickson. Feel free to read about- she survived her hanging! But she couldn't be punished again so basically she was "dead" but still alive so she lived tax free the rest of her life...ah-mazing. We also learned about where the term "shit faced" originates from...feel free to read about it here! That night our program treated us to dinner at Brewhemia a huge restaurant with live music. That night we went to a pub after.

The next day we took a bus tour excursion to the Scottish Highlands. That will have its own post. We had delicious pizza that night accidentally as we tried to go to some restaurants but they were all full because of a Rugby match and this restaurant didn't have a TV so it was empty!

On Sunday, we went into Edinburgh Castle. This was more of a museum than I expected but cool and we got to see the crown jewels of Scotland. That afternoon my friends and I walked around and found a delicious bakery. At 3:30pm we took the train back to London.